Bonus crops?

[Mrs Dobby]

We've had a few things 'pop' up on the plot recently, 'volunteer' spuds and garlic, plus a lot of celery seedlings (perhaps I should have moved the seed heads a bit sooner last year), now as they arent causing a problem, we decided to leave them alone to grow (will probably rule us out of the allotment competition for tidy plot again this year), at least until we needed the beds for something else!

Well, today we harvested enough new spuds for 2 of us and 24 bulbs of garlic from volunteer or bonus plants! It got me to windering, what do you do remove the volunteer and keep the plot neater, of let it grow and enjoy a bonus crop?

Whats been your best bonus or unexpected crop?

[chengjing]

So true. My favourites got to be hardy annuals like mustards, red orach and tree spinach. You sow once and let them flower and seed, then you got them forever.

[Veggiemama]

Wow, that was certainly a bonus.

My hasnt been vegetables, but a wild (or oriental poppy) FIL gave it to me a few years back in my old house. I was taking some plants (ok, a lot of my plants) with me to this house and last summer the poppts came up again.
This year (even though i collected the seeds last year and have sown them) the poppys are coming up everywhere, even in the tiniest wee crack at the bottom of the house wall.......I love these and seem to get all sorts of colours, even though the original ones were purple (now i know there is a proper explanation about the colours, but i dont know what it is.

If i were to get any bonus veggies, i would keep them....all food on the table plus, i couldnt bear to get rid of something growing unless it was a nuisance.

veggiemama

[Two_Sheds]

My hasnt been vegetables, but a wild (or oriental poppy)

I bet it was an opium poppy? Big fleshy glaucous leaves, as opposed to green hairy ones?
Zazen sent me seeds of a nearly black one, and I already had a very lovely red one at the lotty, and a double. Every year I get loads of horrible mauve coming out too, so they go straight on the compost heap.
This year though, nearly every poppy is a double red, lush.

[womble]

We get loads of opium poppies coming up every year around here, I think they used to grow them a long time ago near this area for opium.

I've always wondered, just out of interest, if I could make a "crop" out of them

[Two_Sheds]

I've always wondered, just out of interest, if I could make a "crop" out of them

Apparently the white one is the most productive, and it's the latex-like sap that's used, not the seeds (otherwise we'd all be tripping out on poppy seed bread) The opium fields of England... heroin-producing poppies grown to make NHS pain-relief drugs | Mail Online

[womble]

Apparently the white one is the most productive, and it's the latex-like sap that's used, not the seeds (otherwise we'd all be tripping out on poppy seed bread) The opium fields of England... heroin-producing poppies grown to make NHS pain-relief drugs | Mail Online

I wondered when I googled imaged the opium poppy I got white ones in Afghanistan.
The ones round here are mostly pink, with various different shades.
They're legal to grow, but illegal to cut for the purpose of collecting opium I think.
Even if you accidentally cut one with a knife while harvesting something else.

[shirlthegirl43]

I have volunteer spuds this year too Mrs D. Pigletwillie said I should dig them up in case of blight but since they will be ready long before that I left them

On the poppy front, can you use any poppy seeds on bread or is it a specific variety? I love poppies and bought my first papaver for the garden this year (don't usually grow flowers)

[maytreefrannie]

Volunteer spuds have supplied us with small amounts over the years - when my youngest child was small he used to love to pick them.

The most prolific volunteer in the garden here is borage - first sown over 20 years ago and still coming up in profusion in various spots in the garden - I love its flowers and use the leaves to make a garden feed, don't normally use it for anything else, though I believe it can be used. I love it though.

[trish60]

My pea bed is full of rocket & I m now having to pull it up from all over the garden as there is only so much rocket you can eat. It s lovely though!

[crazii_c]

altho i havent got an allotment, i did get a volunteer crop in a way. my old chilli plant surprised me by growing chillis this year, it was rather neglected last year and did product anything and was just left in a corner somewhere. and as im new to growing your own i didnt know chillis could be kept for another year bonus!

[chris]

I get a lot of weeds

[JennyGiraffe]

The biggest surprise on the new allotment has been that the large unidentifiable thing in the corner is actually horsehadish! So much horseradish that we'd actually need to buy a herd of cows to use it all up! Anyone know of anything else to do with it...

[cupcake]

I have volunteer spuds this year too Mrs D. Pigletwillie said I should dig them up in case of blight but since they will be ready long before that I left them

On the poppy front, can you use any poppy seeds on bread or is it a specific variety? I love poppies and bought my first papaver for the garden this year (don't usually grow flowers)

In Alys Fowlers book The Edible Garden she mentions using" Opium poppy, papaver somniferum,corn poppy, Papaver rhoea, Arctic poppy, papaver nudicale and all their resulting cultivars And also the seeds of love in a mist tho they aren't the nigella seeds that are sold."

[shirlthegirl43]

Thank you cupcake, thought it best to check before I poisoned us all